A Temporary Diaspora: Contested Cultural Representations in Tuareg International Musical Performance

Abstract

What occurs when local residents travel, but also continually return home, and become increasingly self-conscious about their culture and history and how these are represented? The goal of this essay is to understand the roles of culture and memory in a traveling performance of Tuareg musicians from Mali, and to show how multiple viewpoints are alternately woven together and not woven together in the fabric of the performance event and wider processes surrounding it. International performances by touring African musicians and singers offer rich perspectives on current anthropological issues of culture, identity, and memory in globalization and diaspora. This essay draws on data from longterm field research in Tuareg (Kel Tamajaq) communities in Niger and Mali, West Africa and among Tamajaq-speaking expatriates and travelers in France and the United States. Central here is a case study of a Tuareg international musical touring ensemble called Tartit from northern Mali. There is analysis of their origins in the "home culture" and background on the Tuareg more generally. This is followed by analysis of the Tartit ensemble's promotion in the media, including interviews, their performance in the United States, and additional more longterm processes surrounding that performance event. [End Page 793] More broadly, the goal is a more nuanced understanding of representations of culture and memory that move beyond mere "hybrids" in transcultural flows. These representations, I argue, reflect meta-messages in which there is shock of not only "the Other," but also shock of "the Self," in new worlds at home as well as in the borderlands.